After CRI Kasauli, the Pasteur Institute of India in Coonoor has started production of DPT group of vaccines on 15th of this month. The institute is now able to release the first batch of DPT vaccines from its laboratory in December this year.

The union government has given permission to produce Tissue Culture anti-Rabies Vaccines (TCRV) simultaneously, but due to technical reasons the Institute will be able to produce it a little late as some more days are needed to finish the renovation work, said a senior officer from PII.

According to sources, this year Pasteur Institute will manufacture 32 million doses of DPT for which, the Union Health Ministry has allotted Rs 16.2 crore. The Ministry has asked the unit to resume production with the required facilities on February 26 this year.

All the three units, BCG Lab in Chennai, CRI Kasauli and PII Coonoor were given the go ahead signal by the ministry on the same day after a period of 2 years’ suspension of licence. CRI was the first institute to open the shutters after ministry’s order came. In April this year the unit started production of DPT group of vaccines. These three public sector units were supplying the essential vaccines required for the immunization programme of the country.

The BCG vaccine manufacturing company in Chennai is the remaining unit to operate its laboratory despite the ministry’s order. The director Dr Usha Sworen Sing said expert staffs from HLL Lifecare Ltd, the agency which has been entrusted with the responsibility to construct the GMP facilities in the unit as per international norms, have visited the institute last week. There are some more processes to be accomplished to start production besides approval from authorities.

In January 2008, the then Union Health Minister Dr Anbumany Ramadoss had suspended the production licences of the three units on the ground that they were not complying WHO GMP norms. But later, when the present government came to power, there were pressures from political parties and NGOs to revoke the suspension order and start production. The halt in production at the units has affected the supply of primary vaccines for the national immunization programme. Later the situation has resulted in the shortages of potential vaccines which forced the private sector vaccine producers to hike the prices. All these have persuaded the present health minister Gulam Nabi Azad to revoke the suspension order of the former health minister. The units were producing vaccines against tetanus, tuberculosis, measles and other infections.

Pasteur Institute had earlier sent the action plan to the secretary of Health and to DGHS following the letter from the health ministry. It had to do a lot of work including machinery repairing and services because of non-work for a two year period. Now the institute is engaged in the establishment of a fully equipped GMP facility of international standards.